Munim Kumar Barai

Development Dynamics of Remittances in Bangladesh

Remittance inflows in the economy of Bangladesh are getting larger every passing year, matching with the increasing external demand for its manpower. The ensuing development impacts of remittances, as a means of transfer of wealth, on socioeconomic factors are increasingly viewed with importance. Remittances have helped improve the social and economic indicators like nutrition, living condition and housing, education, health care, poverty reduction, social security, and investment activities of the recipient households. The relative weight of remittances has also increased against most of the macroeconomic variables alongside the contribution to GDP. Moreover, Bangladesh has been able to avoid any serious imbalances in BOP’s current account, although it has persistent merchandize trade deficits. Not only that, the export tradable sector has thus far remained unaffected from the Dutch Disease effects of remittances.

Cross Border M&As in Emerging Economies: Evidence from Indian Trends and Future Directions

Abstract The global reforms in the last two and half decades have resulted in the adoption of different growth and expansion strategies by enterprises in the emerging economies. In this backdrop, Indian enterprises have been undertaking restructuring exercises primarily through M&As to make their presence felt even across the borders. This new trend of cross-border mergers and acquisitions (CBMAs) activity occurred in India with the advancement of liberalization and globalization process. This paper has been successful in exploring and documenting the evolution and trends of CBMAs for the period of 1990–2011 and analyzes the emerging patterns of cross-border engagement of Indian enterprises with a comparative domain to unearth the reasons and future directions. Direction from this paper indicates that firms from emerging countries like India go for international diversification to obtain intangible assets and resources which they do not possess.

Understanding the Indo-Japan Economic Relations in the Asia-Pacific Century

A period when the world’s economic gravity is shifting to the Asia-Pacific region with the promise of an Asia-Pacific twenty-first century, Japan is increasingly facing pressure to maintain its economic and political position vis-à-vis China. To minimize any adverse impact, Japan needs to expand its economic horizon crossing the hitherto established boundary, importantly focusing on one or more countries to increase its strategic depth in the international economic relationship. India seems to be uniquely placed to get Japanese attention for such engagement for a number of advantageous factors it holds. With a vast population, diverse demography, increasing economic promise, democratic governance, soft power and physical location at the core of South Asia, India makes a bona fide contender to play an important role in the emerging global order. This article argues that a deeper economic cooperation between Japan and India can benefit Japan Inc. through the expansion of economic space, on one hand, and may accelerate India’s rise in the global order, on the other. But for a cooperation of mutual betterment, both countries need to position themselves for becoming complementary to each other. They will face a number of barriers at both ends though.

The Grameen Bank “Empowering the Poor” Model of Microcredit: An Institutional Comparison with the Traditional Mode of the Japanese Banking System

This paper proposes an institutional approach to understanding the success of a South Asian “empowering the poor” model of microcredit — the “Grameen Bank”. We compare the institutional settings in the model with those in the traditional mode of Japanese relation-based banking which greatly contributed to Japans high growth, to shed an analytical light on the advantages and sustainability of Bangladeshs microcredit industry. We find that the availability of bank rent opportunities, low level of transactions costs, mainly in terms of low monitoring costs and delegation costs, together with the well-rooted protection and sanction mechanisms, which are properly aligned with both formal and informal institutions, guarantee the success of the GB mode of microcredit in the current context, as it guaranteed the success of the Japanese relation-based mode of banking during its high growth period.

Vietnam: achievements and challenges for emerging as a FTA hub

Abstract Vietnam joined the Association of South East Asian Nations in 1995, and that opened its gate afterward for participating in the Free Trade Areas (FTAs) with regional and international partners. The pace of Vietnam’s economic integration through FTAs gathered momentum since 2001. By 2016, it has singed 12 FTAs, of which eight have already become operational, and is negotiating another four for formation. With this FTA endeavour, Vietnam is set to emerge as an FTA hub along with Singapore and Thailand in the South East Asian region. In selecting partners and signing FTAs, Vietnam maintains a distinct economic and political strategy. The participation in older and new-generation FTAs has brought both opportunities and challenges to Vietnam. This study aims at examining and discussing the FTA drive of Vietnam to emerge as an FTA hub, identifying the achievements and challenges appeared in the process, and proposing some measures for Vietnam to address the FTA related challenges in the coming years.

Globalization and Indian Manufacturing Enterprises

Abstract Indian manufacturing enterprises (IMEs) are undergoing a phase of transformation. Changing economic policies and global outlook have brought both opportunities as well as thought points before IMEs. This piece of research has brought assessment as well as discussion on present state and viewpoints on IMEs through the lenses of globalization. The discussion revealed that the Government of India needs to undertake several policy decisions to make Indian manufacturing firms more globalized. The perspective moves in a sequential manner starting from evolution to manufacturing, overview of Indian manufacturing, covers the journey of globalization facets/dimensions, undertake the state of IMEs to justify the points of authors and draw conclusions on this field.

Economic Interdependence of Japan and China: An Understanding

Recent developments between China and Japan are seemingly shaping a collision course and creating tensions in their bilateral economic relations. Economically, both countries are important to each other and any adverse event is likely to have a bigger long-term impact on their economies. This is because of the depth and width of the economic and financial engagement developed between them. On the one hand, China is now Japan’s biggest trading partner. Japan, on the other hand, has a substantial amount of investment in China. All the major Japanese companies are now deeply engaged in production in China and it is a strategic spot in their international supply chain. Similarly, short-term Japanese portfolio investment is playing an important role in the Chinese stock markets. Beyond these economic and financial linkages, Japan, in recent years, has been seeing an increasing number of open-wallet Chinese tourists to the delight of its sluggish economy. This chapter examines the possible economic impact of any disruption of this interconnection between China and Japan.

Paramita Mukherjee, Arnab K. Deb and Miao Pang (eds), China and India: History, Culture, Cooperation and Competition

Paramita Mukherjee, Arnab K. Deb and Miao Pang (eds), China and India: History, Culture, Cooperation and Competition. New Delhi: SAGE Publications, 2016, 232 pp., ₹945 (hardback). ISBN: 978-93-859-8569-0

Investment Flows from Japan and China to South Asia: Are They Matching with the Economic Prospects of the Region?:

In 2013, China and Japan accounted for about 16.8 per cent of world’s outward investment and 6.1 per cent of outstanding FDI stocks. Due to underlying objectives and strategies, they seem to differ in selecting economies for their investment. While the Japanese investors invest distinctively more in the developed economies, the Chinese investors invest mainly in the developing countries. This article, however, looks into the Chinese and Japanese investment in the South Asian economies and finds that they are yet to channel any significant amount of FDI to this region. This contrasts the investment positions that the Chinese and Japanese investors have followed in the economies of East and Southeast Asia. At the moment, Japan has much higher investment stocks than China’s in South Asia, though the Chinese investment in the region is catching up. However, the article argues that investments from these two major investing countries have not matched with the economic growth record and prospects of the region. In fact, most of the countries in the SAARC have the potential to grow more quickly than many other parts of the world, and Japan and China should take notice of this fact while devising their investment approach.